


A Week and a Half Later...

by caveyoja



Series: The Family You Choose [6]
Category: Runaways (TV 2017)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-02
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2019-06-20 14:38:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15536439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caveyoja/pseuds/caveyoja
Summary: Gert  worries about Chase and how he's dealing with his feelings about his Dad.  Later, someone spots Gert, Chase and Molly at the flea market.





	A Week and a Half Later...

Gert sat up in bed and looked at the empty spot next to her. Frowning, she checked the clock – 4am. She’d mostly been sleeping through the night since she’d been back on her meds, and since she hadn’t needed him to talk her down from any nightmares, Chase had started getting up before her and working out.

At least, that was what he was calling it. He’d been pissed off at Alex ever since he told them about Darius knowing where they were - pretty much the same way he’d been pissed off when Alex had missed Amy’s funeral. And, as had become obvious to her, when Chase was pissed off, he needed to hit things. Since there were no convenient Lacrosse team assholes, he’d built a gym in his old room, and he worked out his aggression in there, punching a sand-filled bag until his hands bled or she pulled him out of there, whichever came first.

Objectively, what he was doing should throw up a big red flag. It wasn’t that much of a step from him hitting an inanimate object to him hitting an asshole from the team to him getting angry with one of them and hitting them. But, “objectively” didn’t take into account of how self aware Chase was about what he was doing. He’d explained it to her as he was building the gym: his anger had been pretty much out of control after his mom talked him into coming back when he ran away, so she had set up a gym for him. Whenever he felt like he had to take a swing at his dad, he’d go to the gym and work out instead. The added benefit was that his dad started thinking twice about hitting him or his mom after he’d packed on some muscle. Gert supposed that worked out well enough – but couldn’t help but be pissed off that Chase’s Mom hadn’t gotten them both out of that situation and gotten Chase the counseling he so very much needed.

Because, even if he was handling the anger without endangering anyone, it couldn’t be good for him. Anger meant stress and high blood pressure and general unhappiness and self destruction. She wanted to help him – she’d wanted to help him ever since they were six and he’d told her about his Dad – but how the hell could she help him out here, with zero mental health facilities available? Even if she talked to him and convinced him to get the help he needed to deal with whatever PTSD he was going through, what could they do about it? It wasn’t as if they could go to a counselor, and even if they could find a support group for him there was too much of a chance he’d be recognized. 

Nope. The best she could do for now was to try to talk with him. Not that she had a problem talking about anything. Chase, though? When it came down to talking about what he went through growing up, he’d refined shutting himself down to an art. Given his father she guessed it was a survival skill. But, however helpful it might have been then, it was starting to eat him alive now.

She got out of bed, pulling the comforter around her shoulders, and slipped out of the room without waking Lace up. Padding down the hallway in stocking feet, she paused before opening the door to Chase’s room and listened. It was dead silent – and that was even scarier than hearing him beating up on the punching bag. She knocked on the door, and called out, “Chase?” before entering.

He was standing in front of the bag, his bare chest was covered in sweat and there was a smear of blood across his knuckles. She stepped into the room and saw the expression on his face – his eyes glared into the distance, and his mouth was twisted into an angry grimace. Honestly – if she didn’t know him? She could see being scared of him. Maybe part of her was a little scared, but she didn’t want him to know that, because that would make him keep the anger bottled up even tighter. 

She watched him for a moment, not sure if he knew she was there, and, after he didn’t move, she stepped closer, but kept her distance so she wouldn’t startle him, and called out again, “Chase?”

Chase came back to himself, blinking as he looked around the room with a confused expression on his face. When he saw her, he broke into a genuine smile, “Hey – sorry – I was somewhere else. You been there long?”

She smiled back, handing him a towel from the stash he kept on the dresser, “Not long. Just missed you when I woke up and you weren’t there.”

“Yeah,” he nodded toward the bag as he toweled himself off, “I had some stuff to work out.” 

Gert saw him scratching at his week and a half’s growth of beard. His tell that he was on edge used to be him running his hand through his hair, but for the past couple of days he’d been doing this. She raised an eyebrow, “Want to talk about it?”

Chase’s smile widened reflexively as was about to say no, because every other time he had heard that question before the person asking it really hadn’t wanted to know the details. But, his smile dropped as he realized this was different. He might be absolute shit at reading most people, but this was Gert, and he was getting better at reading her – and from the look on her face, she honest to God did want to know. Even more - if they were going to be together, she deserved to know what she was signing up for. The problem was, the only thing he was worse at than reading people was talking about his Dad, and everything in his life always seemed to come down to him. He pulled on a clean shirt and sighed, sitting down on the bed, “I don’t know where to start.”

Gert sat down next to him, taking his hand and threading their fingers together. “Doesn’t matter. Talk about anything.”

Chase thought for a moment, then looked at Gert with a smile. “I like your hair. It kind of looks like it did when we were eight and you had to cut it because Barrett dumped all that glue on your head.” At Gert’s raised eyebrow, Chase quickly realized he hadn’t said that her hair looked good, and he stumbled for words, “I mean – it looks good, you know? Not that it didn’t look good before - “

Gert put her hand over his mouth to stop him from babbling, “Stop while you’re ahead, sweetheart. I’m glad you like my hair.”

Chase smiled. He loved it when she used pet names for him. He squeezed her hand and fell back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. There was a water stain in one corner, which was kind of weird because they were in pretty much the desert, and there was no second floor for it to leak from. “Do you know if it ever rains around here?”

Gert looked at him with a confused expression and then followed his eyes to the stain on the ceiling. She laid down next to him and looked up, “It does sometimes. Dale and Stacey took us out around here one year when they wanted to collect some kind of plant samples – it rained so hard our campsite nearly got flooded out.”

Chase folded his free arm under his head, relaxing into a conversation that definitely wasn’t about his father “You went camping? I thought you hated camping.”

Gert chuckled, “I do hate camping. But, it was go with them, or stay with Dale’s cousin and his family for a couple of weeks.”

“Wait,” Chase laughed as he remembered when Gert’s relatives had visited, “Was that the guy in Sacramento with the creepy kids? The Stepford Sisters of Sacramento?”

Gert nodded as she laughed as well, “Yep – the bleached blonde barbie wanna-bes with Daddy’s charge card.” She turned her head to him, “You know they were fighting over you?”

Chase sputtered in surprise, “I was like 12!”

Gert smirked and shrugged, “So were they – well, at least the youngest was.”

Chase leaned back, closed his eyes and shook his head, “Ugh – no. The peroxide fumes alone would be enough to kill the few brain cells I haven’t sacrificed to alcohol or traumatic brain injuries.”

Gert smiled, “I had your back. Made sure they wouldn’t bother you.”

“Oh yeah? Did you tell them I was going out with you?”

“Are you kidding? They would have considered saving you from me to be their god-given-duty - so I portrayed you as someone who was utterly antithetical to their worldview.”

Chase narrowed his eyes and tried to decipher what Gert had said, “So...you told them I was a Democrat?”

Gert smiled, “Better. I told them you were gay.”

Chase stared at Gert for a second, and then burst out laughing. A few seconds after his laughter stopped, his eyes widened and he muttered, “Holy shit - that explains Jake.”

“Jake?”

“Yeah – from Lacrosse? He moved down from Sacramento last year, and he said he had some friends back there who said he should look me up, so he hit on me at a party.”

Gert thought for a moment, and then she placed who he was talking about, “Oh – Jake! The token gay guy on the team.” She winced and looked at him apologetically, “Sorry.”

Chase shrugged, “It worked out ok. I really wasn’t into the team groupies, and I wondered – you know – maybe I was into guys? So I found out I wasn’t, and Jake was cool with it being a one time thing.” Chase saw Gert staring at him, and he bit his lip nervously, “Is that weird?”

“God – no – I mean I get experimenting – cause you don’t know until you try, right? It’s just, I thought you had sex with at least some of the Lacrosse groupies.”

Chase frowned, “Yeah. I did. I’d go to a party, get drunk, and next thing I know, I’d be in a bedroom with some girl whose name I barely knew. You were the first girl I ever had sex with when I was sober.”

Gert blinked. “I’m….flattered?”

Chase rolled onto his side to face her, but avoided looking at her eyes, “Jake said if I wasn’t into some random guy or girl, then maybe it was because I was into someone specific, and no one but them would work for me.”

“Hunh,” Gert responded.

“Hunh?”

Gert shrugged, “One of my exes told me pretty much the same thing. Said they hoped I would find whoever I was looking for, because it sure as hell wasn’t them.”

Chase raised an eyebrow, “They? Was that Robin?”

“You knew I dated Robin?”

Chase shifted onto his back, and Gert followed, lying on top of his chest. He narrowed his eyes as he remembered, “I think it was Elena first, then Mark, then Robin, and finally Miguel?”

“Close – Robin was before Mark. And you know this how?”

He looked down at her, “I told you – I always saw you. Even if you’d ruled me out, I still wanted you to be happy with someone. Mark, though? Total douche. Miguel was a major upgrade – I was almost sorry when you broke up with him.”

“Almost sorry?”

“I might have been a bit jealous.”

“You know – that is just bordering on being stalker-y.”

Chase shook his head, “Stalker-y would have been telling Mark to stay the hell away from you. All I did was beat him up for bragging about having sex with you after you two broke up.”

Gert’s eyes widened, “That asshole!”

Chase grimaced, “You know – I’m not sure anyone believed him. He was always making shit up.“

“He sure as hell made that up. I was supposed to be tutoring him in history, and he started getting way too grabby, so I dumped him.” Gert rolled over onto her back and glared at the ceiling.

“And now I wish I’d hit him harder.”

“I guess that explains why Lucas asked me out after homecoming – I thought he just wanted help with his homework, but he -”

“Lucas asked you out?”

Gert’s lip turned up in disgust, “Yeah. And now I know why.” Gert sat up and raked her hands through her hair – she still wasn’t used to it being so short after Nico had cut out the last of the purple dye. “So – are you like the only guy on the team that’s not an asshole?”

Chase sat up and shrugged, “Jake’s cool, I guess.” Gert leaned into him, and he put his arm around her, kissing the top of her head. “So – why’d you break up with Miguel? He seemed like a really good guy.”

Gert sighed, “Yeah, he was. Perfect actually. That was kind of the problem.”

“What do you mean?”

Gert pulled the arm across her shoulders closer and laced their fingers together again, bringing his hand up to her lips and kissing it. “Objectively, he was perfect. He said and did everything right. He was – is – a good person, and he really did deserve better than me just dumping him without being able to tell him exactly why. I guess sometimes you just don’t connect, you know?”

Chase nodded, “Yeah, I know. I don’t think I’ve ever connected with anyone the way I connect with you.” Gert stretched up to kiss him, and Chase pulled her onto his lap, kissing her back before pulling her into a hug. “I just… I don’t want to hurt you.”

Gert pulled back, running her hand through his hair, “You couldn’t hurt me.”

Chase huffed out a humorless laugh, “I already did, remember”

“I get why you did that.”

Chase looked down, not meeting her eyes, “Even if there’s a reason it happened, it still happened. You got hurt, and it was my fault.”

Gert put her hand under his chin and tilted his face up so he was looking at her, “You had to get away from your Dad – it was his fault, Chase.”

Chase tilted his head down again, and Gert saw tears in the corners of his eyes. He whispered, “But what if I’m just like him?”

The look on his face brought Gert back to Nico’s birthday party when they were kids – the first time he’d ever talked about his Dad. Chase had showed up with his arm in a cast and muttered an explanation about tripping over a cord in his Dad’s lab, and it was his fault and he shouldn’t have been there anyway. Everyone else bought it but her – she knew how strict his Dad was about Chase being in the lab. No way would he have gone in there, and no way was she going to let someone hurt her best friend. She’d pulled him away from the party while Nico was opening presents and insisted he tell her who hurt him. He’d tried a couple of times to get her to buy the lie, but eventually he’d broken down – just like this – with tears in his eyes and unable to look at her.

Her anger at his Dad hadn’t faded in the ten years since then, but she knew just getting angry wouldn’t help him. She was and would always be Chase’s best friend, regardless of whether or not she was his girlfriend. She wrapped her hands around his face, tilting it up to look at her, and brushed away the tears with her thumbs. “You’re not like him. If you were, then the thought of being like him wouldn’t bother you.”

He shook his head, “I wish I believed that...but, sometimes he seemed so sorry after he hit me or my Mom – he didn’t want to be a monster...it just sort of happened.” He grabbed Gert’s hands, bringing them up to his lips and kissing them, and then looking her straight in the eyes, “Please – Gert – please promise me that you won’t ever let me hurt you. That you’ll leave before that happens.”

She wanted to tell him that would never happen – that she had faith in him – but she knew that wasn’t what he needed to hear right now. However much faith she had in him, the problem was he didn’t have faith in himself. She kept eye contact with him, and nodded. “I won’t let you hurt me or any of us. I promise.” She squeezed his hands more tightly, “But, I also promise that I’m not going to let you go through this alone. I will always be your best friend, and I will make sure that you do NOT turn into him.”

“You think you can save me?” Chase asked with a sad half-smile.

Gert raised an eyebrow and smirked, “Have you met me?”

Chase wrapped his arms around her, and let out a deep breath, “Meeting you was the best day of my life, baby.”

“You better believe it was,” Gert said, turning her head to kiss his cheek, and then whispering in his ear, “I love you, and I’m not letting you go without a fight.”

Chase whispered back, “I love you too.” He felt his arms shaking as he held her, and he buried his face in her hair as her arms wrapped more tightly around him. He concentrated on his breathing, slowing it to try to calm himself. After a few minutes he was calmer and slid his arms down Gert’s back. He tilted his head down to kiss her and whispered, “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Gert smiled as she pulled back, getting off his lap and pulling him to his feet, “What you would do is stay is this really bad smelling room and forget to take a shower or eat breakfast.” She saw him start to smile and pulled him by the hand to the door, “So – first thing, Jock Jams, is you taking a shower. Then, you buy me breakfast -”

“Buy you breakfast?”

“Well, make me a packet of oatmeal – whatever – it’s the thought that counts.”

“You got it. Oatmeal and coffee.”

“Coffee? Are you kidding? Have you tasted that crap that Alex makes? Sorry, babe, diet Pepsi or no deal.”

“You drive a hard bargain, Yorkes.”

“Yes. But I’m worth it.”

“Yeah, you are,” Chase agreed, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and kissing the top of her head as they went back to her room.

 

* * *

She’d been spending weekends with her Dad ever since the divorce. At first he tried to make it up to her by splurging on her – clothes, restaurants, concerts – more father/daughter time than she’d ever wanted. But, as she got older and his gallery had taken off, he’d started to work on the weekends and dragged her into it. That meant she got to see a disturbingly large set of new and questionably talented artists every weekend when the weather was good enough to drag them out of whatever holes they crawled into between the flea markets and fairs and whatever festival happened to crop up that week.

But, she wasn’t bitter. It wasn’t like she didn’t have better things to do. Like, you know, practice for the dance team. Or hang out at a party with Brandon. Then again, Brandon was getting a bit clingy, so maybe getting away from him for a while wouldn’t be a bad thing. Hanging out with Chase was more fun, but he’d disappeared along with that blond slut and his other weird childhood friends.

This market wasn’t too bad at least. Yes, it was the desert, but it was a college town, and there were at least a couple of vegan food trucks that might have even passed a board of health inspection. There was some kind of Latin music playing at the far end of the field, and she was headed toward it when she got the text from dear old Dad….who told her to take the car and head back whenever she wanted. Translation: he was in the process of hooking up with that tattooed redheaded sculptor he’d been stalking as his latest find.

She stared at her phone. If she headed back now, she’d be home before her Mom had reached the end of the night’s bottle or two of Chardonnay and she’d get interrogated about who her Dad was hooking up with. But, if she waited another hour or two, Mom would be passed out, and she could probably avoid her for the rest of the weekend. So – wasting a couple more hours here it was. Hopefully without getting robbed or food-poisoned. She slipped her phone into her purse, hooked the strap around her neck, and headed toward the music.

The band wasn’t bad. Some kind of fusion, but it had a pretty good beat, and the stand was surrounded by people dancing to it, with another ring around that of people who were watching the dancers. She would have liked to dance, but, out here alone? Too much of a chance someone would decide for her that she needed their company. And, given the market clientèle, she’d have to give that one hard no. The redhead her Dad was picking up was pretty much the top of the heap here.

So she watched the dancers, because, if nothing else, she knew dancing. There were a lot of uncoordinated, probably drunk college kids with more enthusiasm than talent. A few older couples practicing moves they’d probably learned for some wedding or other. One older gentleman in the middle of the floor was actually very good – led well enough to carry whoever he was partnered with. 

There was one girl who stood out, though. Right near the stage, and putting everyone else to shame. The lead guitar broke into a solo, and most of the other dancers paused, first to listen, and then to watch this girl, because she really was that good.

And, oddly familiar. Had she seen her at a competition? They usually didn’t compete against schools from around here – dance teams cost money, and that was one thing the schools in this area didn’t have. She still hadn’t placed the girl when the music ended, and watched as the girl smiled, catching her breath while the crowd clapped for both her and the band. Two people came out of the crowd and hugged her…

And it snapped into place. The girl was using the same moves Molly Hernandez had used when she auditioned for the team. One of the people who had come out of the crowd was Chase – she’d recognize that ratty backpack of his anywhere, even if he did have a scraggly beard and dark glasses. She wasn’t sure who the other one was – some random girl with short brown hair – which meant it wasn’t that slut Karolina, so there was that at least. 

When Chase had disappeared she came up with a theory: he had only gone along with whatever his friends were doing to protect Molly. Because, honestly, that was the kind of guy he was. Most of the guys on the team were cool, even if they were a bit unreliable, but Chase was one of the few you could really count on. So – if he was protecting her, then maybe he just needed some help to rescue her? It was the only thing that made sense – because there was no way he’d hang out with those losers otherwise. And – she could help him! She could help them both. They just needed to get away from the other girl, and she could get them back home.

She watched as they turned to leave, ducking into the crowd when they turned in her direction. She trailed far enough behind them to not be seen, and then ducked down behind the van where they stopped, listening in so she could figure the best time to rescue Chase and Molly. 

“So, you got everything?” Molly asked.

“Yep,” the other girl confirmed, “Notebooks for Alex, sewing stuff for Nico, that vegan crap Karo eats...”

“The parts I needed,” Chase picked up, followed by a pause and some rustling, “And the books you wanted.”

“Yes!” Molly shouted, “I can finally finish Harry freaking Potter!”

The girl laughed, “You saw the movies -”

“But the movies leave so much out!” Molly whined. “Even if I could’ve gotten the laptop away from Alex, I couldn’t start writing fanfiction without reading the books!”

“Not like it’s stopped other people,” the girl observed.

“Yeah, well, not me. I’m not starting anything until I know everything about the story.”

“Thatta girl!” Chase encouraged.

There was a quiet pause, and she heard things being packed into the van. After a while Molly asked, “So, what’d you get?” 

“Just a couple of books,” the other girl answered. “Trying to keep up with studying. We’re not going to be out here forever.”

Molly snorted, “No – that’s why you should be enjoying it while you can. You two should be spending your time snogging instead of studying and building things.”

“Snogging?” both Chase and the girl laughed.

“Oh, you know exactly what I’m talking about. You two are like an old married couple – Alex only made the no PDA rule because you couldn’t turn a corner without running into Nico and Karo being all over each other.”

“It applies to us too!” the girl protested.

She heard Molly scoff, “No – it really doesn’t.”

“Oh yeah?” Chase shot back. She heard a high pitched squeal, followed by giggling. Her curiosity got the better of her and she peered around the back of the van. Chase held the girl in his arms, dipping her down, one of her legs raised in the air in what would have been a dramatic final dance pose . They shared a long, deep kiss, and then pulled back and smiled at each other. Then they both smirked and turned their heads to look over to Molly.

Molly shook her head and climbed into the van, muttering, “Oh, yeah, now you two figure it out, just before we have to drive back two friggen hours! Two hours of nothing but shmoopy puppy dog eyes...” Molly’s complaints were cut off as she slid the van door shut.

Chase let the girl up, and she finally got a closer look at her, but still couldn’t place her. She was familiar, but it just wasn’t clicking. 

“Sorry about that,” Chase muttered.

The girl looked down, and nodded, “Oh..ok...I guess you were just trying to prove a point, right? I mean -”

“No,” Chase broke in, grabbing her hand, “No – I am not going through that again. I’m sorry I didn’t give you any warning or ask if you wanted me to kiss you before I did it. But, I’m not sorry that I kissed you.”

The girl’s face brightened, “Yeah?”

Chase beamed back, “Yeah.” He put his arms around the girl’s waist, and she put her arms around his neck, and they stared into each others eyes for a moment before they leaned into each other and another long slow kiss. She watched, her mouth hanging open – because, he was trying to trick this girl, right? He was only doing this to get Molly out of there. Or, had this girl done something to him? God knew what kind of sick - 

The van door slid open forcefully, and she dove back behind the van. “Get your butts back in this van and get on the road right now, or I will tell Alex we were late because you two were snogging!”

Chase and the girl broke away from each other again, laughing and wiping their hands across their mouths. The girl reached into her jacket pocket and put on a pair of glasses, tilting her head to the van, “You want to drive, or should I?”

“I got it, Gert – you’re better at navigating anyway.”

Her eyes widened, and she stared at the van as it pulled away. Gert? Gert Yorkes – the purple haired freak who had called her a hateful bitch. That was the proof right there: no way would Chase Stein ever be interested in a fat, purple haired geek like her. He was playing her and he was planning to rescue Molly. But something was wrong, so he hadn’t been able to get them out. 

And that was where she came in. She sprinted back to her father’s car and unlocked the glove compartment – his 45 was still there. She smiled as she peeled out of the parking lot, following on the same road they’d gone down. Just hang on, Chase, she thought, Eiffel Dumas is on her way to rescue you!


End file.
